Chapter 6: The Festival of the Tides
The day after their prison break, Thea, Alvyn, Tyranny, Berrain, Haroof, Drake, Raven, Crow, and Rook gathered in the basement of Sutherland's Lenders to discuss how best to counter Nari's plans. The Festival of the Tides was only a week away. After much deliberation, they eventually agreed that their current problems were threefold: first, the Templar Knights were occupying the city in force, and they needed to be driven out. Second, the black sand was likely already in position in and around the Bazaar, and it needed to be disabled. Third, Nari the Trickster himself was a powerful and dangerous foe, and he was probably holed up in the Shrine of Tymora with dozens of guards. He needed to be taken out. The group formulated a plan: Drake would go into the city and rally as many of the Freeport Guard as were still loyal to him, take them down to the docks, as far away from the Shrine as possible, and cause a ruckus. He would go from street to street engaging the Templar Knights and try to defeat them in battle. This, hopefully, would draw the Temple forces away from the Shrine of Tymora and the Bazaar, leaving those positions relatively undefended. While he was doing that, the Kenku would gather their criminal network and go house to house in the area around the Bazaar, looking for black sand and disarming it by dousing it with water. Finally, the adventurers would go to the Shrine and try to get inside and kill or capture Nari himself. The party hid themselves in an alley near the Shrine of Tymora and watched for several hours until finally a messenger approached the company of Templar Knights at the entrance and led them away toward the docks, leaving only two behind as guards. Haroof, keeping to the alleyways and side streets, made his way around to the back of the Shrine and cast a spell to shatter the largest stained-glass window he could find, then quickly ran back to the group. While one of the guards ran around the building to investigate, the adventurers quickly dispatched the other. Tyranny then disguised himself as the dead knight and the party laid an ambush, killing the remaining guard and hiding the two bodies in the bushes. With the guards taken care of, the group entered the Shrine. In the head priest's office, they found documents detailing exactly how many kegs of black sand were in the city, as well as their locations. They also found a letter addressed to Nari containing references to an excavation in Reah; the sender signed his name only as S.I. Tyranny sent his imp familiar to deliver the black sand documents to the Kenku at the Bazaar, and the group pressed forward into the Shrine's sanctum. Nari was waiting for them. He angrily explained to the adventurers that all he wanted was to turn the city of Freeport, a rotten cesspool of sinners and heathens, back to the light of the Temple. He claimed that what he was doing was for the greater good; he was merely sacrificing the few for the benefit of the many. The party was not moved by his arguments, and they attacked, but Nari would not go down easily. He created four illusionary duplicates of himself and used his unique magic to confuse and harass his foes. He eventually fell before them; however, before they could land a killing blow, he vanished from sight. While heading toward the Bazaar to help look for the black sand, the adventurers met with Drake and Raven in the middle of the city. With the documents from the Shrine detailing the exact locations of the kegs, the Kenku were easily able to complete their task and render the sand inert with water. Drake, who was accompanied by the Templar Knight whom the party had shown Randall's letter at the Bow, explained that most of the Temple forces had had no idea what Nari was planning. When they had found out, the majority of them had left the city without a fight. The Freeport Guard was back in control with very little blood shed. Drake was not worried about Nari; without his Templar Knights, and without the element of surprise, the threat he posed was negligible. All that remained now was to repel the sahuagin attack on the night of the Festival, which he said would be a walk in the park for a battalion of forewarned and prepared guardsmen. He told the group to go and get some rest, and that he would see them at the Festival in a week. One week later, at sundown, the Festival of the Tides was in full swing. The adventurers enjoyed the various activities and games, winning both the drinking contest and the Battle of the Bards. At close to midnight, they were called to the main stage. Drake Shieldheart and the Mayor of Freeport granted them the title of Heroes of Freeport, but before they could continue, the ceremony was interrupted by a loud noise from the center of the Bazaar. The large main tent went up in a huge column of flame, and standing at the center of the destruction was Nari the Trickster. Behind him was a massive, fiery portal. He mockingly congratulated the party for damning the souls of everyone in Freeport by stopping his plans, then said that if he could not redeem the city, he would watch it burn. He snapped his fingers, and a horde of demons poured out of the portal and into the panicking crowd. Drake shouted at the group to stop Nari, then ran into the crowd to join his guardsmen in fending off the army of demons. The adventurers rushed to the center of the Bazaar, but before they could reach Nari, he screamed into the portal, offering his soul in exchange for power, and transformed into a ten-foot-tall vulture-like demon. They party fought him fiercely, and although his new demonic form was extremely powerful, they were able to finally kill him for good. When he fell, the demonic horde was pulled back through the portal, which vanished, and a bright white beam of light shot up from Nari's corpse into the sky, where it shattered into hundreds of smaller lights that streaked off into the night sky in every direction. When the group looked around themselves, they realized that the entire assembled crowd of citizens had been watching their fight. Cheering and screaming their names, the crowd carried them on their shoulders back to the stage. Drake joined them and told them that the wealthiest citizens of Freeport had dipped into their collections to reward the heroes with rare and powerful magical items. After receiving their rewards, the adventurers enjoyed the rest of their night at the Festival, then returned to the Smiling Eel Tavern to rest.